There's much material out there on the Net about presentations and all the elements that comprise the presentation, the speech, visual aids, etc. Some good, some not so good, but one of the most interesting I found was the Why? How? Prove It! method for writing excellent presentations quickly.

What I like most about this method is its simplicity and the fact that you can use it in the great variety of presentations you may encounter in your professional career.

This method, written by Graham Jones is available in full at www.whyhowproveit.co.uk but here I'll give you a quick summary of the main points. The first step and crucial to any good presentation is to develop the key message of the presentation. You should work thoroughly on this key message and make sure it contains the main action or behaviour you wish your audience to take as a result of listening to your presentation, to whom is the presentation directed to and make reference to an example which you will elaborate on during your presentation.

For example, a key message could be as follows:

"As you are all professionals that want to succeed in your professional careers, you need to be a fluent Business English talker. In the next 20 minutes I'm going to show you how my trainees succeed and you're going to be so impressed I'm sure you will want to take part in my Business English Coaching Scheme."

Ok, so this key message tells you:

Who the message is for - the information is clearly directed to people who want to be successful in their professional careers and need Business English to achieve it, all the rest can fall asleep.

What they will do - they will want to take part in my Business English Coaching Scheme.

Why - to for fill their desires of success.

When - in the next 20 minutes.

Now without beating around the bush, in the first 18 seconds of the presentation everyone is clear about what they are going to listen to and if the audience is the correct audience, they will be eager to learn more, asking themselves why they should take up your call for action.

And that's exactly the next step; answer the question why? because this method works through the logical mental process an audience develops, answering the questions and providing them with the information they want in the moment they need it. So, next answer WHY? Why should they take action or in my example, why should they be part of the Business English Coaching Scheme.

Once you have got across your key message and explained why, most of the work is done. The next step is to explain How they can do this, but far more important is the final step - You must prove it. You must prove through evidence that what you have said is beyond dispute. You can do this through case studies and statistics, but probably the most convincing way is through personal examples, short stories that prove your point.

There's this short simple method, just develop a key message and answer Why? How? and then Prove It! and you have a convincing presentation.

comprise - comprende
speech - discurso
Prove It - pruébalo (dar evidencias)
available in full - disponible en versión completa
key message - mensaje clave
thoroughly - en profundidad
behaviour - comprtamiento
impressed - impresionado
take part - participar
achieve - alcanzar
fall asleep - quedarse dormidos
no beating around the bush - sin marear la perdiz
works through - trabajar ordenadamente
beyond dispute - irrefutable